Heastie: Final budget won't link school aid to teacher eval plans

ALBANY—Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie said Tuesday the final budget will not tie school aid to the submission of teacher evaluation plans, as Governor Andrew Cuomo has proposed.

“The money will go out the door, but the school districts will have to respond and get approval from [the State Education Department] by November,” Heastie said of the evaluation plans, which will have certain components that require local negotiation.

Story Continued Below

Heastie also said he doesn’t believe the new system undermines or threatens the collective bargaining rights of teachers, despite their claims to the contrary.

The Board of Regents and State Education Department will have a “wide range of ability” to influence the creation of the state’s new teacher evaluation system, Heastie told reporters, even though the Cuomo administration has described education officials' role as largely administrative.

Heastie said there is a “sizable amount of money” in the education budget and that the education department will receive funding to “help put together this new evaluation system.”

“They’re the education experts, and as the Legislature, we’re asking the education experts to do their responsibility,” Heastie told reporters shortly after the bill governing the state’s education, labor, housing and family assistance budget was formally introduced.

Asked how his conference felt about the finalized education reforms, Heastie said: “A lot of the concern members had was the negotiation with [Cuomo] on things the conference couldn’t live with,” referencing the numerous policy items the governor attempted to tie to the state’s budget bills.

“Members raised a lot of ... issues concerning implementation,” Heastie said. “You’re making these kinds of changes—members had questions, so we answered their questions.”

The budget bills are being printed, and Heastie said the Legislature is “hopeful” the budget will be passed on time. He dismissed criticisms of the rapid and private nature of the negotiations, arguing it was necessary for the budget to be passed by midnight Tuesday.

“It’s not an ideal world, it’s not an ideal situation, but people in the state want an on-time budget,” he said.